(STAR-TELEGRAM) — Call it the Rick Perry gold rush: The governor wants to bring the state’s gold reserves back from a New York vault to Texas.

And he may have legislative support to do it. Freshman Rep. Giovanni Capriglione, R-Southlake, is carrying a bill that would establish the Texas Bullion Depository, a secure state-based bank to house $1 billion worth of gold bars owned by the University of Texas Investment Management Co., or UTIMCO, and stored by the Federal Reserve.

The idea isn’t entirely new. Some Republicans worked on a gold bill last session that was never filed. And gold-standard-backing Ron Paul, the former Lake Jackson congressman, has raised repeated concerns about the safety of states’ gold supplies.